Bad behaviour and apathy costing candidates jobs

Bad behaviour and apathy costing candidates jobs

PETALING JAYA: JobStreet, the Ministry of Education (MOE) and TalentCorp Malaysia have joined forces in a sincere effort to stem the incidence of ill-preparedness and general apathy that fresh graduates and junior executives have towards job interviews.

Called the “Be My Best @ Job Interviews”, Simon Si, head of regional communications for JobStreet said, “The aim of this programme is to educate candidates to be serious about their job applications, to be prepared for the job interview by researching and understanding more about the company and to make sure they attend the interview upon receiving an invitation.”

Si said this in reference to a recent online survey by JobStreet that showed 87 per cent of employers encountered candidates who exhibited bad behaviour when it came to job interviews.

Speaking about “Be My Best @ Job Interviews”, country manager of JobStreet.com Chook Yuh Yng said, “This is the first time in Malaysia that an initiative like this has been launched to address the issues of candidates’ poor interview etiquette – in particular their “No Show” attitude.”

Candidates will also have the benefit from having a badge appear on their resume page once they take the “Be My Best @ Job Interviews” pledge.

Speaking about the pledge, Chook said, “By getting them to pledge, we want candidates to take their interview invitation seriously and do their best at interviews.”

Among the “bad behaviour” cited in the online survey apart from “No Show” was “Lateness”, “Improper Attire”, “Unprepared candidates” and “No Response to Interview Invitation”.

The majority of the candidates were from a pool of fresh graduates (62 per cent) and junior executives (66 per cent).

The official launch of the “Be My Best @ Job Interviews” will be held at an event themed “Be Serious, Be Prepared, and Be There” at MaGIC, Cyberjaya on November 6, 2014.